Drifting
by Vacancy
Summary: And I can't feel here, but I love the feeling of peace . . .
1. Drifting

I'm running a race but one always wins. It's never me. It's never been me. So maybe know I can win, even for a second, maybe I can win. Her hand gently cups the back of my head, and nausea attacks me, but its nothing compared to what I'm feeling now. A kaleidescope of colors swirl around me and I smile distantly. I'm lifted up a centimeter, an inch, but I feel myself slipping even farther the closer I'm held. I'm bleeding faster and faster and faster and the blood flows thicker with every second.

Wet tears land on my face and I manage to turn my head a fraction of an inch.

"Are you crying?"

A harsh, choking, sobbing sounds from above me and I smile just a bit, lift myself up a few inches and nearly sputtering with the effort. The pain barely compares to the feelings I'm experiencing. Joy for being this close to her; horror that she's crying over me, nirvana for the same reason. And some far off, unnameable feeling I liked more than I should admit. Black ate at the corner of my vision; but there was peace beyond that black; I wanted to go there so much. But I just had to do this so she would know once and for all, so she would know with my last breath I supported what she thought was some simple fancy.

"Ichigo, I'll teach you something good . . ."


	2. You are too cruel, oneechan!

Hello, I'm Ash. I forgot to say that this was going to be more than a oneshot, so you probably assumed it was just another lame take on Kisshu's death. But; this may continue for a while or only one chapter, but it really depends on how many reviews I get. Reviews received: 0

That makes me sad.

When his lips nearly brushed my cheeks panic attacked. I had frantic flashbacks to the one day when he had popped up and given me a kiss. The shock had numbed my common sense. I couldn't feel anything but horror and a slight feeling of fulfillment. After I had gotten home I had stared at the wall for a few hours until Pudding snapped me out of it with a super-hyper phone call describing an incident with Taruto who had smiled at her. Or it might have been a really odd bush. Pudding wasn't sure. A few days ago she had been babbling on about Taruto again.

"Do you think he'll ever kiss me na no da? Like Kisshu kissed you, even though you didn't like it, na no da?"

"No, I didn't like it at all, and he'll never kiss you!" I snapped, not thinking. The lies were like thorns on my tongue. Puddings eyes had watered and she ran off to the restroom, saying

"You are too cruel, oneechan!"

Regret had stabbed through me like an unsavory heat.

Ah, she was so perfect. Her strawberry hair was just the right shade of red, her bumbling ditziness just as extreme for it to be terribly endearing but not so far as to make her look like a fool. She was so right. And the feeling of individuality in my affection for Ichigo faded away. Who wouldn't love her like I did? Who could resist her fast way of speaking when she was excited, how her eyes turned to adorable crescents when she fully smiled. My hatred for Masaya ebbed a fraction when I realized he probably sought after her just as much as I did, only Ichigo loved him too. Somehow, Ichigo. Somehow I'll make you mine. It will have to wait until the next life, certainly, and many more lifetimes for me to find her. But I will. And right now she was holding me, and through the tiny hole left in my vision I could see her ears standing on edge as she screamed.

"KISSHU!"


	3. Gilded Gates

A/N: I'm finally getting the hang of this! I've gotten one review, but this is my first fic so I'm not F-REAK-ing out. Enjoy Chapter three!

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So I died with you loving me. Even if only for that one second you loved me. Even if seconds later it all faded when Deep Blue was killed, for that minute you loved me. You may have felt something for me, right there, you refused to think of it as true, what you felt was lies; like everything that came out of my smirking mouth.

Deep Blue is dead. Pai is dead. I can feel his soul ache for the green Mew. Just like mine is devastated by leaving Ichigo. But right here is the most glorious feeling. Maybe everyone else feels it every day, but the wrath of my planet and the swirl of feelings I always had to cope with somehow blocked out this peace. I had thought of it as laziness, of being foolish, but now I couldn't fathom how I could have been stupid enough to block this out. Swirls of peace and quiet whispers of comfort formed a current in the river to death. The gate was so far away, but I could have stayed here forever. I wonder what I looked like. A translucent stretch of nothing maybe, or maybe I was my body, a dead corpse pulled along by currants of love. Ichigo's face was imprinted on my mind, crying over my death, but other faces, words assailed me while I put my feelings to rest.

"Kisshu, eat your supper now . . ." my mother gently chided as I glowered at a plate of muck.

"No! I hate this food and I hate you and I hate this planet!" I had shouted at her. Hurt had flitted across her features but she had hidden it well.

"Sweethear—no" she gasped as her fingers began to spasm. Her eyelids fluttered open, closed. She slumped forward and shook violently. I had screamed.

"Mother?" I had asked softly as she stopped shaking. "Mother?"

But she hadn't moved.

Taruto and I, foster brothers, making up stories of the flower of Earth, each more elaborate than the first. It had springs of pure water and crops of a sugar so sweet your mouth stung. Poisons for the sick and dying, to put them out of the endless pain we had to witness when someone fell ill. We asked Pai to join us in embroidering, he had just looked at us coldly from his bed.

"We will never see Earth." Was all he had said. Taruto and I had made faces at him when he turned around.

And then Ichigo, cradling my head and singing a sweet but mournful lullaby. I told her in hushed tones thats how I felt when I saw her, like it was a magic denied to me, a feast kept from a starving man. She kissed me quiet.

I'm at the gilded gate now. I wonder what lies past the golden bars of a perfect cage.


	4. You

A/N: Thanks to my reviewers!!!! I can't believe I'm posting so fast! It's been, what, two days and four chapters? And, to Escune, I put little stars in the second chapter but they got out for some reason. So sorry about that!

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A sort of hum breaks out on the gate, and even though my eyes are closed and I'm still half-attached to the real world that now seems so fake, I can see a golden light filtering in through the golden lace work. It's Ichigos lullaby, and as the river pushes me gently forward my foot brushes the bar everything explodes in a shower of sparks. Eyelids or whatever insubstantial thing that shades my eyes from seeing shoot open and I realize this is no golden gate. My mind had painted pictures of golden light behind a perfect barrier, of a clear river and gentle sounds. The gate was a decrepit wall of wood and nails nailed in the wrong way, barbs along the barrier. The river was black with shifting things, glints of red that twinkled like rubies. The smell of rotting things is thick in the air, and I give a howl.

"Don't cry . . . Don't sigh . . . Perfect things are father than the reaches of w-i-i-ings . . . ." Ichigos lullaby, coming over the water is accompanied by words. Only it's not her normal fast talk, or her depressed murmur, its a heartfelt slow, aching song that carries words of peace. I can't hear anything but the beautiful words. I force my eyes to stay open and look around. Spread eagled on the surface of the water, like she was riding on a raft that I can't see is the Monkey Mew, not transformed, smiling dreamily like she was feeling the utmost ecstasy. Like I had felt moments ago. Only now I know it was false, the water is thick with oil and pollutions, and the gate is a rotting dais of wood.

"Stop! Stop! Get out of the water!" I scream, but no sounds come out. I start to move but the water holds me down, the lies of peace and serenity beyond the gate are only traces of what they were, and not strong enough to fool me. The monkey will reach the gate in a few moments, and I can only hope she can open her eyes. I try to struggle and splash around in the foul water, but the strain of keeping my eyes open is too much, the energy to resist the call of never ending sleep is making me sick. Something soft brushes against my arm and I turn my head the tiniest bit, all I can do. The porpoise Mew is lying in the water almost like it was her bed, clutching one of Pai's fans. Her braids trail along the water like two snakes, and she is moving so much faster than I was, she has completely given in to the gate; unable to protest what she knows is wrong. Her eyes are slowly sliding shut. She opens her mouth as if to scream in pain, but nothing comes out. Silent as I. But this not sound gives me the power to look around, to kneel in the shallow, awful water. I see the silhouette of Taruto on the shore, almost alive but still drifting into death. The blue Mew turns in the water, limbs splayed like a star, rotating like a dancer. The purple Mew lies stoically in the water like she's already in a coffin, her eyes shut and arms by her sides.

"No! No no no!" I scream, and it makes a tiny sound. I stand up, trying to fight the urge to just lie down and drift forever. The current nearly topples me but I manage to stay upright, just as a pulse of pink light echoes through the river.

And suddenly I see Ichigo, stumbling into the water of her own objection, running, splashing towards the Purple Mew, the only one close.

"Zakuro! Zakuro where are we? ZAKURO!" She shakes her but the Mew just splashes back into the water.

"Minto!" she cries and runs to the blue Mew. "Minto, oh, not you too!" She looks around desperately searching for something to see as alive.

"Kisshu." She says, voice blanking of all emotion as her eyes travel over all of it, even of Deep Blue far through the gate already. I start walking to her and she reaches out scratched arms to me, and I hold her. Her knees buckle and I gently lower us into a sitting position. She looks up at me with her pink eyes filled with tears. I cradle her in my arms and she relaxes, but her mouth opens, the sounds coming out scratchy as she struggles to speak.

"I-I-I love M--" I knew what the rest of the sentence was so I just leaned down and kissed her. I felt the letters reverberating in her throat. A-s-a-y-a.

" . . . you." she said after I pulled away. She looked at me one more time with her wonderful pink eyes, filled with tears. "I love you, Kisshu."

The End


	5. Afterword

I just wanted to thank my two reviewers and do an illegal bump up to the top of the list, becausre I want other people to read this fic. I loved it, and I want to see if others do too.Love you!

-Ash


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